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Southern
comfort
Georgia songwriter reaches maturity on resonant new album
Earlier
this year, after contributing a little bit of everything else over
the span of three workmanlike decades in the music business, Randall
Bramblett added one overlooked item to his resume: a full-bore killer
solo album. Let's drive the point home straight out of the gate.
The Athens, Georgia-based singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist's
No More Mr. Lucky (New West) is far and away one of 2001's best.
A simmering cauldron of distinctively Southern rock, R& B, jazz
and pop stylings, the 11-song collection sears its way into your
brain and penetrates deeper with time.
Before
we go any further I should fill in a few blanks. All but the rock
history hounds and inveterate liner note readers among you are probably
wondering, who the hell is this guy? Fair question.
Bramblett,
the son of a small-town Georgia carpenter and a one-time religion
student at the University of North Carolina, made his first lasting
marks in the '70s. Initially as a promising songwriter and solo
artist, then later as the anchor of Greg Allman's touring band and
a member of the groundbreaking Southern jazz-rock outfit Sea Level,
he earned a player's player tag in musicians' circles. But when
the critically acclaimed Sea Level's momentum stalled, a bitter
and disillusioned Bramblett hit the bottle hard and essentially
dropped out of music for most of the '80s, retreating to a workaday
existence in New Orleans.
He returned to his home state in 1987, ostensibly to enter grad
school and crank up a meaningful new career. That's when a call
came in from a longtime admirer, former Traffic director Steve Winwood.
Much to his own surprise, Bramblett eased back into circulation,
landing sideman and session gigs with Winwood, Gov't. Mule, Widespread
Panic, Levon Helm and others. A 1998 solo effort, See Through Me
(Capricorn), Bramblett's first in over 20 years, generated a lot
more critical praise than sales, but left no doubt that one of the
South's most gifted and literate tunesmiths had what it took to
rise above his respected journeyman status.
No
More Mr. Lucky ends the discussion. This is the deeply resonant,
mature work of a restless, soul-searching artist who's struggled
mightily to get comfortable in his own skin. A poignant air of wistful
midlife reflection hovers throughout, from the muted desperation
of the funky, percolating opening track, "God Was in the Water,"
to the bittersweet acoustic guitar pop of the set closing "Disappearing
Ink." Although Bramblett leaves no fleeting moment of transcendence
unnoted - simple gratitude takes visceral form on a song like "Sunflower"
- look elsewhere for Hallmark homilies. With this guy you get existential
black humor ("Hard to Be a Human") and comfort in the
knowledge that it's never too late for even a serial screw-up to
learn from his mistakes ("Lost Enough").
I could
go on about Bramblett's deft lyrical touch - "Aching For a
Dream," his tribute to Beat icon Neal Cassady, does Kerouac's
fictional Dean Moriarty and his running buddies proud - but it would
be a crime to shortchange the music on No More Mr. Lucky. The songwriter
and his studio compadres, notably guitarist Davis Causey, a kindred
spirit since the Sea Level days, concoct a soulful Southern stew
indeed. Primarily a keyboardist and horn man, Bramblett's affinity
for jazz-juiced R&B permeates the album. His weathered tenor,
a marvel of an instrument, couldn't be better suited to the task
at hand. But there's a rocker's sensibility at work here too, particularly
on the roaring "End of the String," simply one of the
most powerful blasts of breakup angst you'll hear this or any other
year.
Let's
face it, nothing any music writer could say is likely to kick open
many doors for an intelligent, format-defying and relatively obscure
middle-aged artist like Randall Bramblett. That's the nature of
the radio beast and only a greenhorn would imagine otherwise. Or
a stubborn, ornery cuss like me. This one's too damned good to be
ignored, folks. Do yourself a big favor and give No More Mr. Lucky
a spin.
Mike
Thomas
Pacific Sun
November 14 - November 20, 2001
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